


Topsy Turvy Roller Rink

by atheniavenesia



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1980s, Cigarettes, Coitus Interruptus, F/F, Hand Jobs, M/M, Semi-Public Sex, nachos, roller skates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-07 18:27:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11629341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atheniavenesia/pseuds/atheniavenesia
Summary: 'When Gabe licks at Jack’s bottom lip seeking sanctuary, it's granted and then he’s tasting Jack in earnest. It’s the aspartame sweetness of soda on his tongue and mint and something beneath that Gabe swears is fruit, something sweet and light and baked into Jack’s DNA.'





	Topsy Turvy Roller Rink

**Author's Note:**

> 80s Overwatch AU, with all that would entail. Expect cigarettes, mentions of roller skates, and gratuitous neon sign usage. Also, all ships besides Reaper76 are going to be background ships, or just mentions of previous stuff.  
> Also, there has been some confusion and I will clear that up here at the beginning. Every main character is 24, with Sombra and Widowmaker being the exceptions at 22 and 25, respectively.

Gabe feels that blond kid staring. He’s known it for the last half hour, been doing the extra little inhale with his cigarette he knows puffs his shoulders out a bit. He lets the smoke leak out of his nostrils. Nicotine and tar down his throat and on the back of his tongue and so deep in his lungs he can’t cough it out. He doesn’t need to, hasn’t needed to cough since the ninth grade once he’d gone up to a pack a day.

“You gonna fuck him?” Sombra asks.

Her eyeshadow is garish in the neon light of the roller rink parking lot. It works for her, though. When he looks at her like this, half-smirking and nails tapping on the hood of Akande’s car, she looks like a goddamned siren. He smiles back at her, drags his tongue across the front of his teeth.

“Maybe,” he says. “Probably. Might let him fuck me.”

She bends forward and laughs. Hard, too. It’s for their observer’s benefit, he knows. That and the way she brings up a hand to trail along his arm, nails doing a walk up to his shoulder.

“Don’t let him hear you say that,” she says. “Might kill him to hear language like that.”

She grips his shoulder a bit tighter for a moment and cuts her eyes to the side. ‘Look-what-you-could-be-fucking,’ she stares at their observer. Gabe laughs now, leaning back so he’s damn near laying down on the hood. He sees a few more people walk past them, heading inside on their first dates, because who in this fucking city doesn’t go on a first date to Topsy-Turvy Roller Rink?

“Are you two still ogling that fucking prep?” Akande asks from the driver’s seat.

Sombra turns. She’s movement and motion and that fucking purple eyeshadow. She smiles with her sharp canines and leans into the window. He can’t look away from that built blond boy with those piercing eyes standing next to the vending machine.

Gabe can just barely hear her say. “Just returning the favor, Akande. You know how much Gabe hates looky-loos.”

Akande with his baritone response. “That’s not the way I heard it.”

Amélie from the backseat, probably still stretched out and painting her nails. “Do you make a habit of knowing exhibitionists?”

Gabe wants to say something. Maybe not defend his honor but say something, for sure. But then he thinks about bending Blondie over the hood of Akande’s car and has to shift because the denim on his dick is suddenly too much.

“He’s got a hot friend,” Sombra says.

Her voice is pitched differently, angled to Amélie.

She gets a noncommittal sound in response.

He can hear her smile. “I’m serious,” she tries again. “Gabe-certified.”

That’s not a lie, not technically, and that’s Sombra’s favorite kind of not-a-lie. From a distance, Blondie’s friend had looked fine to him, maybe a little female for his tastes, but alright if you were into that sort of thing. And then he hears Amélie shifting because of course that gets her attention. Gabe can’t hold it against her, though. Sombra’s taste is odd, even for their ragtag little outfit. She’s an unknown factor, even for Akande, and he makes a point to know everybody. She’d just showed up one day in tenth grade with half her head shaved and spinning a key ring around one finger.

“This seat taken?” she’d asked.

She hadn’t waited for an answer, just sat on the table and smiled that smile that would later make Gabe’s stomach churn with slow excitement. Back then, though, he hadn’t known her from Eve. Akande either, and she must have seen the spark of irritation brewing behind his eyes because she’d laughed and leaned in close to the three of them with a spark in her eyes.

“Listen,” she’d said. “We’ve got about twenty minutes to break into the principal’s office before the janitor realizes he’s missing his keys. I could always use some accomplices.”

Gabe had laughed, and Akande had grinned, and Amélie had stared on with the faintest quirk of her lips that could have been a smile. The next few years were a blur of alcohol and barely dodged felonies.

Now, though, he only has half a mind to pay to Sombra’s antics because Blondie is licking his lips and damn if that tongue doesn’t look like the most wicked thing he’s seen all night. He flicks his cigarette onto the pavement.

“Hey, we got a fucking problem?” he yells over.

He hears Sombra laugh again and push off from the car. “Your technique leaves a little something to be desired, amigo.”

He looks back for a split-second, enough to see that manic gleam is back in her eyes.

“I think it’s working just fine,” Akande says.

And when Gabe looks back, Akande’s right because Blondie’s coming over. He’s a lot more muscular that he’d looked next to the vending machine, and he’s got his eyebrows drawn down over his eyes. He looks like he might be able to beat the shit out of Gabe and the way his dick starts to firm up is whole other fucking can of worms.

Sombra does a quick two steps up to him. “You got this, or do you need me to keep playing wingman?”

He grins. He can tell from the way that it pulls at his cheeks that it’s more a baring of teeth than anything else.

“Oh, I got it.”

Sombra watches Blondie approach. She likes what she sees, as much as Sombra can like anything in that fucked up way of hers, because her grin grows even wider.

“Me and Akande are gonna grab some soda,” she says.

“We’re going to do what now?” comes the response.

Sombra clicks her tongue. “Come on, like you want to watch Gabe nut in his jeans over getting socked.”

A rumble that must be agreement. Then, “I’ll take it out of your skin if you do anything to my car.”

Gabe nods and pushes away from the hood of the car. There’s a lot of leeway the group can get from Akande, but the car is absolutely off-limits. He hears the shocks shift as Akande steps out and then Sombra is leading him away talking loudly. He sees the way her eyes focus on the blond, and she might fool Akande but she doesn’t fool him. He takes two swaggering steps forward, meets the blond just before he reaches the car.

“Like I said, do we got a fucking problem?” he asks.

The Topsy-Turvy sign, bright against he night sky, paints him in six different shades of neon green. He’s hot, fuck is he hot. He’s got a tilt to his lips, though, a little smile that says he’s used to getting his way. Gabe cracks his knuckles.

“I don’t know,” Blondie says, and that’s not what Gabe was expecting.

It stills him, and he lets his hands drop a bit. This close, there’s something about Blondie’s face that catches his attention. He feels it at the edge of his memory like remembering the smell of the county fair — cotton candy and funnel cake and the press of too many people in the summer heat.

“You’re doing an awful lot of staring to not know,” is what Gabe says, though, because maybe he really doesn’t know how to talk to people.

And Blondie looks down and even through the green light catching on the peaks of his face, Gabe can see him blushing.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

Gabe grunts in response. This isn’t how it’s supposed to go, not at all. Gabe’s got a system worked out, and there’s no room for boys like this with sweaters tied over their shoulder and no blood pounding loud in their ears. By now, they should be well on their way to fighting right here in the parking lot or else fucking just behind the building. He’s got the sensation of how it should be under his nails like grime. He takes a step forward. A heartbeat of space between them now, and Gabe can smell Blondie’s aftershave. It’s caught in his throat like he should be tasting it.

“Why?” he asks. Blondie tilts his head like he doesn’t understand and Gabe repeats himself. “Why were you fucking staring at me?”

His eyes dart to the side like somebody else is asking the question and fuck if that doesn’t irritate Gabe.

“I just thought you looked familiar,” he says to that space just behind Gabe.

Gabe grins. He’s feel that little spark of anger in his chest, but there’s a hot guy right in front of him and fuck if he can’t sublimate with the best of them. It’s back on track, he’s got a script he can work with.

“Well? You and I know each other?” he asks.

He looks down and blushes again. “No, no. I don’t think so.”

Gabe brings a hand up, claps it down heavy on Blondie’s shoulder. “You want to get to know each other?”

Blondie opens his mouth to say something. He stutters instead, closes his mouth with a snap, and Gabe’s got this one.

“Jack, where are you?” comes a voice.

And Blondie flinches like he’s been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“Sorry, that’s my friend,” he says. He makes an abortive shape with his hand. “We, uh, we came here together.”

Gabe grins and does a quick step and turn so he’s got one arm draped over Jack’s shoulders.

“Don’t be rude, Jackie,” he says. He licks at the point of his canine teeth. “Introduce us.”

And Jack really must not do this much because he’s so red when he nods too fast and calls out, “over here, Lena.”

When the two of them turn, a head of brown hair is rushing across the parking lot at them. Gabe catches a good look at her, and he really couldn’t make a more perfect young adult in a lab than is standing in front of him right now with a pair of skates slung over one shoulder and a pair of goggles pushed up over her eyes.

“Where’d you disappear—” he sees her trace the shape of his arm over Jack’s shoulders, follow it back to his body. “Who’s this?”

“This is Lena. Lena, this is, uh…” and he trails off because of course he agreed to introduce them without learning Gabe’s name.

“Call me Ishmael,” he says and puts out a hand to shake.

This girl — Lena — shakes with the bare minimum of trepidation.

He smiles like he’s not thinking of how Amélie’s going to eat this girl alive. Like she was waiting for her cue, he hears the back door of the car open and the click of heels on asphalt.

“Ishmael,” Amélie says. “I didn’t know you were out here making friends.”

He knows she’s in sight when he sees Lena’s face go slack, the way her eyes go down and all the way back up. He sees Jack turn his head to the side, catches him do the same. And it’s all well and good to look, but Gabe lets his hand drop to Jack’s waist and a bit lower so he can grab a handful of his ass and squeeze, just as a reminder. And Jack squeaks loud enough to break Lena from her trance and Gabe watches him explain away the sound.

He’s soft. Nothing like the guys at the bar with their wedding rings and five-day stubble and pickup trucks that if Gabe is being honest, he’s developed a bit of a taste for. Nothing like Akande back in the day when they’d fumbled around in his car. Nothing like Gabe with his hand on a stranger's ass and his dick halfway to hard in his jeans.

“What brings you out here on this night?” Amélie asks.

Her face is impassive, but he’s known her long enough to recognize the arch of one brow, the freshly painted nails short and blunt against her hip. She’s interested, and there aren’t many things she’s interested in that she doesn’t get.

He remembers her showing up in eighth grade with puberty already a distant memory, head and shoulders above their teacher. Ogling her all the while, he’d introduced Amélie to the class and ‘she just moved from France, so everybody please try your best to make her feel welcome.’ She’d nodded along, waited for him to finish so she could look back over her shoulder at him and tell him in her accent that “it’s not so appreciated where I’m from to eye-fuck children.” She was a problem child after that, so it was really no surprise that she fell in with Gabe.

But there’s a time for friendship and a time for something else entirely, and Gabe hasn’t moved his hand, and Jack hasn’t moved his hand, and Gabe’s pretty sure he can talk him into a blowjob in the bathroom so that time isn’t right now.

The people going into the roller rink are starting to slow, and that’s no surprise because it’s got to be going on eleven o’clock at night, and it won’t be long now until the teenagers here start remembering curfew and homework. A few already have, candy wrappers and empty cups left like breadcrumb trails behind them. The wind shifts and the air changes from exhaust to pine needles and dirt blowing in from the forest on the edge of town. Gabe takes a deep breath. It mixes with Blondie’s aftershave, turns wild and masculine all at once.

“Are you in from the city?” Lena asks.

Gabe moves his hand a bit further up Jack’s back, just enough to tuck his hand into his back pocket and squeeze again. It makes Jack freeze up for a moment, brings his teeth together with a little click. After, though, when he relaxes, he leans closer to Gabe, just enough to seem accidental. Gabe sees the shake of his hands, sees nerves and excitement and lust all tangled in the way his tongue darts out to lick his lips, looking just as good as it had from across the parking lot, and knows that it’s purposeful.

“Nope,” Gabe answers. “Mountain View, born and raised.”

Amélie cocks her hip a bit further out. “A city, sure. Annecy.”

Lena grins. She’s stunning with a smile like that, almost enough to pull even his attention. “I figured you were something less than local. I’ve been to Annecy a few times. Lovely views, aren’t they?”

“But of course,” is Amélie’s response. “Everything in France is gorgeous.”

And that’s just on the edge of too much, but she delivers like it’s a fact, like she’s never so much as told a joke in her life. That’s what sells it. It makes Tracer’s eyes go a bit wider, makes her bring a thumb up to dig under the shoelaces keeping the skates on her shoulder.

“I’ve always wanted to go,” Jack says suddenly.

It breaks a bit of the spell Amélie’s weaving, and the way she cuts her eyes to glare at him from the edge of her vision breaks it a bit more. Lucky, then, that Gabe’s the only one to see the second half.

“You should, Jack!” Lena exclaims. “It’s beautiful. The lake — oh, you have to see it. You really could just die looking at it.”

Jack is still red, still with that shake of nerves in the way he brings a hand up to touch at the finely coiffed hair on his head. “Yeah, I bet. Maybe one day.” He clears his throat. “Are you here on vacation?” he asks Amélie.

And god bless him, he’s trying to make small talk with Gabe’s hand on his ass and the beginnings of a tent starting to form between his legs. This is rich, almost good enough to make him forget what he’s angling for. Almost, though, isn’t enough. It never has been, especially not as he leans in close to Jack’s ear and whispers, “how about we go somewhere more private?” with his voice pitched low enough that he’s sure Jack feels the question more than hears it. He stiffens, must be wondering what exactly Gabe means because he has to ask Amélie to repeat herself.

“I said, I am not,” she drawls.

Jack opens his mouth to say something.

“We’re gonna get a plate of nachos,” Gabe interrupts.

And Jack turns to look at him, confusion on every line of his face, and it’s sincere enough that Gabe has to tilt his head back and laugh even as he starts pulling Jack along with him to the front door.

“I could always go for some nachos,” Lena says.

Amélie, though, comes through with a recovery for him, so slick he doesn’t even have to break stride.

“I hate the bustle in there at this hour,” she excuses them. “I’d love to talk out here for a moment longer, at least.”

And Gabe has got to take her to catch a movie sometime because that is absolutely perfect. He leans in close to Jack’s ear, and man this must have been made in heaven because they’re the exact same height and it’s so easy to let his tongue flick out and trace the outer shell of his ear.

“How about this?” he whispers. “You walk into the bathroom, and I'll come in after me. Real smooth, like we don’t know each other.”

Jack, eyes glazed and staring somewhere in the distance at the feel of Gabe’s tongue on him, comes back to himself for a moment, just long enough to bite at his lips and say, “but we don’t know each other.”

Gabe chuckles low and pulls his arm from Jack’s shoulder. He speeds up, looks back over his shoulder and smirks and says, “you’re a natural.”

Gabe pulls the door to the rink open, and Jack’s response is lost to the piped in music, the swell of voice, the clicking of skates — to the roller rink. The disco ball over the rink proper sets shards of light spinning across the walls. He looks to his right and sees Jesse working the entrance, and he couldn’t have planned this better if he tried. Jesse’s cool; still the same little boy he’d babysat in high school — ten years-old and with enough lip to show up with a new black eye every week — but mellowed with age. Just enough to smile when he sees Gabe, wave him through without too much of a grilling. Still, though, Gabe slows as he approaches him.

“You think you can let my friend in, too?” he asks.

And Jesse furrows his brows. “I didn’t know you were in the habit of givin’ out charity.”

Gabe laughs, leans a little closer. “That’s not what I’m gonna be giving.”

Jesse’s smile spreads like molasses, thick and sweet enough to rot his teeth. “Man, you are just unstoppable.”

Gabe spreads his hands. “What can I say? It’s a gift.”

“I still don’t know how you do it.”

Gabe grins. “Last I heard, you had a nice little piece running around town with you.”

Jesse blushes. “Aw, man. Hanzo ain’t like that.”

“You expect me to believe you ain’t getting your dick wet?” he asks. “With Hanzo, of all people? Man, if you hadn’t gotten to him first…”

A wave from Jesse, his face even more red. “I’ll let your guy through, you old trick. Just don’t go hoppin’ on the rink, alright? The boss’ll have my hide.”

“No problem,” Gabe says, straightening up. “I’ll be in and out before you know it.”

“I guess that’s why you don’t have any repeat customers.”

Gabe laughs and walks through. He sees Sombra and Akande sat at one of the tables. Akande’s saying something about the music choice, no doubt. Sombra doesn’t look to be paying any attention at all, at least not more than it takes to nod in the right places. Her eyes are on the entrance, intense in that way she is sometimes. Hidden behind a smile and a tilt of the head, that intensity disappears when she sees him enter. She says something to Akande, cutting right into the middle of his sentence. To his credit, it doesn’t look to bother him. In fact, he looks to the door himself. When he smiles, too, Gabe gets a sinking feeling in his gut. That’s not a good smile from him. It’s devious. He looks too much like Sombra.

“What are you two getting up to?” he asks.

Akande stares back at him, takes a resolute sip of his drink.

“Nothing,” Sombra says. “What happened with that boy?”

Gabe eyes her. “Nothing. Not yet, anyways.”

“What’s his name?” she asks. “Just out of curiosity.”

Gabe answers, feeling for all the world like he’s stepping into a trap. “Jack.”

And Sombra raises her eyebrows and laughs again and takes a sip of her drink once she’s done. “Well,” she says. “Here he comes.”

And when Gabe looks behind him, she’s telling the truth, which is a rare enough occurrence in of itself, but the way she pointedly turns away from him seals the deal — something is going on, and Gabe doesn’t like being the last one to know anything. He watches Jack approach Jesse with his wallet out, watches him get turned away and pointed in the direction of the bathroom. A moment of conversation between those two, and it’s anyone’s guess what they’ve got to talk about. He sees the high flush of color in Jack cheeks, though, and it’s got to be vulgar. He watches him scurry across the floor, eyes on the ground and hands deep in his pockets. Eyes track him because of course they do, men that look the way Jack does don’t usually walk around like they’re trying to fold themselves in half.

“I…” Gabe begins. It’s not worth missing out on a prime piece of ass like Jack, though, because he just scowls and says, “we’ll talk later, Sombra.”

She just laughs and turns back to Akande. He makes his own trek to the bathroom. Jack had eyes on him, but that’s from lack of practice. Gabe’s been doing this years, knows how to keep from being observed. He’s quiet on his way to the bathroom. It’s a single one, and it locks from the inside. He’s not the first person to think of fucking in it, and he’s not going to be the last. Probably not even the last tonight. Jack’s not standing outside of it, worrying the hem of his shirt between his fingers, though, and that means that he’s the only one to think of it right now. That’s what really matters. Still he gives Jack the courtesy of a knock, bangs out shave-and-a-haircut on the door.

“Um, occupied,” comes that voice. A bit higher from nerves, but it’s Jack, no doubt about it.

He turns the knob, twists as he steps in to make sure nobody can see the shape of Jack behind him as he closes it. When he hears that click — and it must be a Palovian response the way his dick starts to really get hard — he walks to Jack.

He leans in and kisses him. His lips are a bit chapped from the wind outside but spit-slick and soft, besides. The antiseptic smell of the bathroom is pungent, making him feel like he’s in a hospital. He closes his eyes against the harsh fluorescents and sees a corner of Jack’s face in negative. He presses harder. When Gabe licks at Jack’s bottom lip seeking sanctuary, it's granted and then he’s tasting Jack in earnest. It’s the aspartame sweetness of soda on his tongue and mint and something beneath that Gabe swears is fruit, something sweet and light and baked into Jack’s DNA.

“Fuck,” he says when he pulls away.

He says it again before moving to Jack’s neck, teeth blunted against his lips to keep from making bruises. Careful, always careful, but it’s harder and harder with Jack’s hand moving to the back of his head; with Jack’s mouth open, free to spill forth his nonsense sounds — _yes_ and _please_ and _don’t stop_ beating the rhythm to his pulse. His hands move from the sides of Jack’s face, trace down the muscles of his chest to rub at the bulge in his pants.

Gabe moves his mouth back up, says something that’s almost Jack’s name before they start kissing again. His fingers are quick, sliding past his belt, past his fly and wrapping around Jack’s dick. It’s searing hot in his grip. He feels a pulse pounding in his palm, and he’s not sure if it’s his or Jack’s. He gives it a few slow pumps, hyper-aware of the tickle of coarse hair on his knuckles.

“Oh,” Jack says, surprise and arousal making the sound half a groan. “Oh,” he tries again, and that’s more like the Jack from the parking lot. “Wait, wait. I need a second.”

Gabe really could die because there’s not enough blood in his brain and entirely too much blood in his dick, but he pulls back. He’s breathing heavy, harsh gasps like he’s been running. Jack is, too, and they stand for a moment like that, trading air in great, shuddering breaths.

“What’s wrong?” Gabe finally manages.

Jack bites his lip and Gabe has to dig his nails into his palm to keep from doing the same, keep from going back to that mouth.

“I don’t, uh”—he reaches down and tucks himself back into his chinos—“I’ve never…” He stops again, and no continuation seems forthcoming this time.

“You a virgin?” Gabe asks.

And that seems a fat chance with the way his ass sits in his pants, with the weight on him in Gabe’s palm. Jack confirms that with a quick shake of his head. His face is already red but it manages more, travels below the collar of his shirt.

“No, no,” he says. “I’ve never done this.” He looks around before taking a shuffling half-step nearer to Gabe, and this Gabe believes is an accident. “Just hooked up with somebody like this.”

Gabe laughs. Hard enough that he has to rest his head on Jack’s shoulder, hard enough that he doesn’t notice the way Jack’s hands come up tentatively to wrap around his wrists. When he does notice, though, he doesn’t break the grip. He instead settles his head more comfortably in the junction between Jack’s neck and shoulder, moves his hands so their fingers are properly interlaced.

“You want me to walk you through it?” Gabe asks once the laughter has died down.

His voice is lower, softer now than before the intermission. The position is more intimate than it should be in a public bathroom where, god forbid, anybody can hear them. It’s fine for now, though, scored by the buzz of the light fixtures overhead.

“I don’t want to put a damper on this,” Jack says. He sounds put out, and Gabe has done this enough that he recognizes a refusal when he hears one. “I just can’t do this.”

His stomach does a quick flip, and Gabe tries to muster up some of that irritation from earlier. He remembers the jut of Jack’s chin from outside, confident and sure of himself in the way rich boys always are. But it’s hard to bring it back, not when Jack is looking away from Gabe with a blush just dying down and his cheek dimpled from where he’s chewing at it.

“It’s no worry,” Gabe says. He doesn’t move, though. “In the future, though, try to let me know before my cock’s ready to bust through the fly of my jeans.”

Jack snorts. However, he’s not moving either.

He’s reminded of sitting in the passenger seat of Akande’s car, still with the taste of the other man on his tongue, still with his pants unbuttoned and pushed down to his ankles. They’d tried it, mostly just to try it. Then, Akande’s voice breaking the silence.

“Thank you for that,” he’d said.

Gabe had shifted to face him, a half-smile on his face. “My pleasure. Still not your thing?”

The answer had been a long time coming, the only sound the crickets from outside. Then, finally, “no, I don’t think so.”

Even more silence. Gabe had kicked his pants off all the way, reached over a hand to rest on that broad chest, exposed and rock hard in the moonlight.

“It’ll be okay,” he’d said with that optimism eighteen-year-olds were singularly possessed of. “That’s not all there is to dating.”

Akande had let out a quick bark of laughter. “I am not worried,” came the response. But still Gabe hadn’t moved his hand and Akande had added on after a moment, his voice quick. “Do you really think so?”

Gabe had laughed. It was the soft laugh, not the obnoxious peals the rest of the group got. It was the laugh Akande got when they were alone, the one he’d used back when they’d met in elementary.

“I’m sure,” Gabe had answered. “I love you, big guy.”

Akande hadn’t said anything, only reached up a hand and rested it atop Gabe’s. The silence that had followed had been the same as this one. Gabe squeezes Jack’s fingers. He’s got callused palms, which shouldn’t surprise Gabe as much as it does.

“Do you want to get nachos?” Jack asks.

“You mean for real?”

Jack nods, and Gabe feels the drag and pull of his stubble on the side of his neck as he does.

“Sure,” he answers. “Sure, that sounds fun.” Then Gabe pulls back and smiles, freeing one of his hands just to hold it out to Jack. “Let’s start over, then. I’m Gabe.”

And Jack’s brows shoot up. “Wait, Gabe? Like, short for Gabriel?”

Gabe cocks his head to the side and his hand drops a bit. “Sure is.”

Jack’s smile is back, wide and honest enough that Gabe loses his train of thought for a moment, caught up in the way his teeth shine like Sawyer’s white picket fence.

“I thought I recognized you,” Jack says, and that’s enough to bring Gabe back to the moment.

“I don’t know any _Jack_ s,” Gabe says.

Jack isn’t put out, though, just shakes his head. This version of Jack is somehow more than the one he’d gotten earlier. He’d say unexpected, but that’s not quite it. It’s a logical progression. But here with Jack’s fingers tightening around his own, he can’t quite manage to figure out how.

Jack grins harder and says, “Jack for John.”

And that makes no sense at all because nicknames are supposed to be shorter, but it does tease at the back of his mind. Close enough to taste, but just out of reach until—

“Wait, John Morrison?” he asks.

When Jack — no, John; wait, still Jack — nods, Gabe exhales all at once because of course John Morrison grew up hot, of course he nearly sucked John Morrison’s dick in a bathroom.

“What are you doing here?” he finally manages, and that’s the least of the questions on his tongue, but it’s the only one that doesn’t feel like pulling teeth.

Jack does a quick once-over of the bathroom. “Can we grab those nachos? We can catch up somewhere else.”

Gabe runs his tongue across his teeth. “Sure, no problem. You head out first, I’ll catch up.” Jack looks confused for a moment so Gabe says, “it makes it look a little better if two people don’t walk out at the same time.”

Jack, again with that dusting of red across his face, nods and unlaces their fingers. He goes to the door.

“See you,” he says.

And he’s gone. Gabe goes to the sink, runs cold water over his hands in a facsimile of washing. Jack’s probably already been ambushed by Sombra, her hand on his arm as she guides him back to her table. And that makes his eyes go wide, because of course Sombra knew who Jack was, but the question is _how_. It’s not answer that he’s going to get an answer to any time soon.

He dries his hands on his jeans and walks out. Just as he’d thought, he sees the bright yellow of Jack’s hair seated next to Sombra and Akande. To his credit, he looks terrified. Good, then, that he has a preservation instinct. He heads over and sees the way Akande’s hand is clasped on Jack’s shoulder, the way Sombra is leaned close, a too-intense look on her face as her mouth moves and moves and moves.

“What are you three getting up to?” he asks.

Jack looks at him hopefully, but it’s dashed by the way Sombra turns to face Gabe and says smoothly, “Just trying to figure out which one of you is the minute man.”

Akande clenches his hand a bit harder on Jack’s shoulder, more visible in the movement of muscle in his forearm than anything else.

“My money’s on you, Gabe,” he says.

Gabe grins. “I’m hurt.”

But he gives no more than that, no more than a quick look to the two of them because they both knew. That’s a bit more worrying than just Sombra because there’s a few people he can take duplicity from and a few he can’t, and Akande is most certainly the latter. He’ll deal with that later, though. For now, he holds his hand out to Jack and guides him away from the two of them and towards the concession counter.

“So,” he begins once their order has been placed and the two of them are leaned against a wall waiting, “like I said, what are you doing here?”

Jack is close to him, but not too close. Not as close as he had been, that’s for sure, but still Gabe feels the phantom press of his skin.

“I just wanted to get out,” he says. He amends the statement. “Well, Lena wanted me to get out.”

“Out from where?” Gabe asks. “You still live in town?”

That’s perilously close to the question he really wants to ask, but Jack doesn’t fumble the answer. He’s starting to feel as though he’s on unsteady ground.

“Yeah, I do. I just work a lot,” he replies. Then, preempting the question, “I’m an engineer.”

Gabe runs his hands over his face. “Engineer? At Overwatch Electrics?”

Jack nodding and asking, “how’d you know?”

“Programmer, upper division.”

Because they work together, because it’s nothing but a coincidence of scheduling that they’ve never run into each other. And then Jack is swallowing and Gabe just knows the question that’s coming next, and he’s only mad that he’s been beaten to the punch because he doesn’t have an answer.

“What happened?”

No explanation needed because there’s no confusion. They both know exactly what they’re talking about. It’s high school, and Gabe is sixteen and never been kissed and he’s hiding under the bleachers with John Morrison, who is everything a dweeb should be plus a pair of eyes that could stop anybody in their tracks. They’re hiding and leaning in nearer and then kissing and Gabe’s heart is in his throat. When they pull apart, both of them startled by the sensation of tongue, Gabe sees him as he is. And it’s too much to see him standing there, rich and smart and well-liked. And Gabe’s just as smart, but he’s too poor, too mean and he feels anger bursting in his chest like fireworks. The threat of violence curling his fingers into fists, and he needs to go before he does something really mean. It’s not Jack’s fault, too, and that’s what really powers his feet when he turns and spits onto the ground, trying to rid himself of the taste of Jack. He’s hearing the beginning of a question, and that’s a bridge too far and Gabe takes off running.

“I don’t know,” Gabe says finally. “I don’t know.”

Jack looks like he wants to ask something else, but he feels that selfsame tension in the air. He must because he goes quiet and meek, and it’s nothing like the Jack in the bathroom, nothing like that Jack in the parking lot. It’s yet another man, this one scared of being left again. And that loosens the knot in his chest and tightens the one around his neck.

“I’m sorry,” Gabe says. “I just”—he cracks his knuckles—“I was a mad kid. I’m a mad person, but it was worse then. I didn’t hate you.”

Jack nods, and his voice is quiet when he finally speaks after licking his lips.

“I was a mad kid after that,” he says. He sounds like he’s telling a secret, voice so low that Gabe has to lean towards him to hear. “I spent a really long time wondering if it was me, you know? You were the first guy I ever had a crush on, and you just… left. Like I made you sick.”

Gabe shakes his head. The mood is heavy, so much so that Gabe feels his lungs struggle to take in his next breath to speak.

“You didn’t. You were just everything I couldn’t be. Nice clothes and parents that came to your meetings because they weren’t busy working and teachers that liked you because you didn’t get mad.”

“I thought you were so cool, though,” Jack says. “You were so good-looking and your grades were as good as mine on top of it. And you walk up to me one day and say, ‘meet me under the bleachers,’ and I was half sure you were going to kick my ass. But I show up and you grab me and kiss me and I stand there thinking my heart is going to explode.”

Gabe smirks and looks to the side because this is getting to be too much, too much and he can’t do this right now. “I’ve gotten a lot better at the kissing.”

And Jack stands there with a look on his face like he has so much more to say, but it clears after a moment and he smiles and nods. “Yeah. Me too.”

And the girl working the counter calls out their names and they reach for the plate at the same time and bump hands. That’s what it really takes to break the tension because now they’re laughing in earnest. They go back to the table and Sombra and Akande make no secret of the fact that they’ve been watching them.

“How did you know?” Gabe asks.

Sombra doesn’t flinch. “I know everything worth knowing, Gabe.”

“It’s hardly the worst thing she’s done,” Akande says, and he’s right.

“It’s still… weird,” Gabe finishes lamely.

Sombra smiles and pulls a chip from his plate, laden with meat and beans and cheese that leaves gooey strings in the air.

“Very weird,” she agrees.

And then Lena and Amélie walk in. Lena’s hair is sticking straight up in the back, somehow more untidy than before.

Akande groans. “In my car?”

And Amélie is just close enough to hear, just close enough to smile and say, “send me the bill.”

Lena is red, and really it’s no surprise that her and Jack are friends, judging by how often they blush. He turns back to his plate and sees that Akande has taken a handful of chips and is chewing them sullenly.

“Jack,” Lena says, still with that pair of skates dangling from her shoulder, “I’m going to hang with Amélie for a bit. Just, uh, don’t wait up, alright?”

Jack laughs. “No problem.”

Lena grins, sights already set on a new target. “Nachos! I could eat a horse.”

And she leans forward and snatches a few of her own. Even Amélie helps herself. Once the dust has settled, the plate is clean save for a few scattered beans. Gabe gasps. He looks over to Jack and sees that he’s chewing, the last chip safe in his hand. He offers it over. Gabe feels so betrayed he hardly wants to take it. He does, naturally, but gives a healthy glare to everybody else at the table.

“Jack,” he says finally. “Why don’t you hang with us for the night?”

He gets that look from the bathroom, that smile that threatens to take over his whole face. It takes over Gabe’s, at least.

“Yeah,” he answers. “That sounds fun.”

And when midnight hits and Jesse comes over to kick them out, Sombra grabs at one of Gabe’s belt loops, pulling him back.

She has that intense look again, waits until everybody’s out of earshot to say, “he’s a good guy, Gabe. Makes almost as much as you, too.”

And Gabe grins because of course she was trying to help, just looking out for him in her own fucked-up way.

“Thanks,” he says. “I owe you one.”

“You sure do,” she says, and she’s back to energy and mischief. “You know how long it took me to get Friday off for everybody? Security is really tightening up these days.”

He pulls her into a side hug, and she allows it because she loves to preen about a job well done. When Jack stops and looks back for him, though, she pushes him off, pushes him forward.

“Go get him, tiger,” she says.

And Gabe gets him.

**Author's Note:**

> Like it? Love it? Gotta have it? God, I want ice cream.
> 
> Also, thank you for reading !


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